After spending two weeks in Hawaii, it's pretty clear why people live there. No, not the perfect year round weather. No, not the fact that sporting events all happen in the early morning, freeing up your afternoons and evenings to do other things. No, not even the year round deliciously fresh fruits or laid back culture. It's because everywhere you go on Oahu, everywhere you look - it feels like Lost!
I can't count the number of times I'd walk past some place and think "this looks familiar". But thanks to the Lost Virtual Tour Website (http://lostvirtualtour.com/) and the "Hawaii Revealed" Guide Books (http://www.wizardpub.com/oahu/oahu.html) I was able to pinpoint some specific locations and confirm my suspicions.
Side note: for anyone going to Hawaii, I can't recommend the "Hawaii Revealed" books enough. Well-written, smart, thorough, and full of a ton of "off the beaten path" stuff - kinda like the Rick Steve's equivalent for Hawaii.
But I digress. Here's a full rundown of what I saw!
1. The Others Barracks. It's actually a YMCA Camp on the North Shore of Oahu, so I was a little worried we were going to get arrested for sneaking around and taking pictures while little kids played across the street - but it all worked out. Clearly the people love that Lost films there, shown by the following painted on the street:
Surprisingly, it looked like people were actually staying in these barracks since there were things like beach towels and bathing suits hanging outside them. But there were a few sections roped off - which makes me think that's where the filming action was going to be happening:
The interesting thing was that one of the areas fenced off was the "playground" area - featuring a swingset that was falling apart and a Barracks door laying on the ground. Take your pick if this means the filming is happening in 2008 Island time (when Sun and Ben visited the derelict Barracks) or if this was just aftermath from the 1977 Island time (after Jack and Co. blew up and shot up the Barracks, stealing the Jughead).
2. The Fuselage (and Beechcraft Plane). Nothing too exciting here, but cool to see. The Fuselage is kept under wraps at an airfield less than a few miles away from the Others Barracks (to keep tourists away, undoubtedly - but you see how successful that was):
The good news is that it's always pretty windy on the North Shore, so it didn't take long for the wind to pick up and reveal that Yemi's Beechcraft Plane is being stored there as well:
Logically, neither of these props were in use - since I can't figure out how either would easily fit into a Season Six storyline - but it is curious that they are still there, rather than being destroyed if they were never going to be used again.
3. Pilot Episode Beach. Directly across the street from the airfield was the Beach where they filmed the scenes for the first few episodes of Lost. Again, super convenient since they were keeping all the airplane parts across the street! Nothing going on there, but still gorgeous beach and cool to see:
4. The Survivor's Camp. The coolest thing I saw had to be another beach (again on the North Shore - but super secluded and tricky to find) where I stumbled upon the derelict campground for our Survivors!
Pieces of Oceanic 815 being used for shelter:
The graves of Boone, Shannon, Ana-Lucia, Libby, Nikki, and Paulo:
Eko and Charlie's half-built Church:
Most of the area was fenced off (with a friendly security guard patrolling the area who indicated that they were going to be filming there) - but I still knocked on some Oceanic 815 parts (real metal) and walked around.
Here's the important takeaway here - based on the condition of the camp, it's the 2008-era camp. Based on the fact that the Survivors camp still exists, they didn't prevent the crash of Oceanic 815, right? Here's hoping, at least.
Lastly, although I didn't run into any human cast members while in Hawaii, I did run into a non-human one. Looks like Vincent is alive and well!
So there you have it, my report from Hawaii. I also saw a bunch of other less interesting things (the Hawaii Convention Center - which is used as the LAX Airport, recreated the Desmond and Penny picture with my hot wife, etc) but figured those would be less interesting to the Blog World.
Now it's time to catch up on a TON of DVR'd TV shows and see how my Fall TV Preview is holding up!
10 comments:
Looks like a great trip! We almost got stationed in Hawaii and would have been close enough to the LOST set for me to try & sneak a peek but it wasn't meant to be. :( I think it's super cute you & your wife did a Des & Penny photo op.
I also hope that you <3 Flashforward as much as I do.
off topic - but did you see the Ace of Cakes (Food Network) ep that has the crew doing the cakes for the Lost cast and crew? Lost related and enjoyable. The cast all had their own cake figure. Sawyer wanted to be less sexy IRL so they had to add a shirt to his cake character.
Hawaii is awesome. Lost opportunites with Hawaii, awesome.
Sigh. Waiting until your blog can really get rolling again.
you totally need to post your Desmond/Penny photo.
what other cool/non-lost stuff did you see? which islands?
I want to like "Flashforward", I really do... but I find myself bored for about 75% of each episode. I don't really care about the majority of the characters, and it seems like the interesting stuff (storyline-wise) is always saved for the last 5 minutes of each episode. I'm going to stick with it, but for now - I can't say that I'm in love with it, sorry.
As for the rest of the trip, I think we saw about 90% of Oahu (you name it, we saw it - drove around the entire Island, hit up all the major beaches, swam with sea turtles, explored downtown / Chinatown, visited all the great viewpoints, did Waikiki, etc.)
On the Big Island, we didn't see nearly as much (since the Island is so much bigger) - but saw lava flowing, hiked around Volcano National Park, hit up the beaches on the Kona side, and felt physically inferior to all the Ironman Triathletes who were there.
All in all, great - but exhausting - trip.
Awesome !!! Thanks so much for sharing your photos and experiences with us!
Brian, I wish I had known you were headed here. I would have given you the really easy directions to the survivor's beach camp. We take all our friends and family that visit there pretty often, and my friend has caught them filming on several occasions.
You are exactly right on the Wizard Pub books. They are by far the best books for the islands. They've never steered us wrong on any island, and the only negative reviews they get are from locals trying to keep people from finding the good hidden spots.
Sad as I am for saying this, I'm now leaning towards the horrid alternate timeline theory.
I'm convinced that the plane will land in LA(with things being 'different'. Maybe people we don't expect to see and others who aren't there.
In THIS timeline. There is no post explosion island. So we'll see people who we associate who are not on the island or others.
Then we have the 'real' timeline. We WILL see action on the island,a s I believe this is the heart of the story. Characters will be in both places but in alternate timelines and the touched individuals will probably have a way of 'knowing' of their other selves.
This seems sort of like the two times from last season with alternate realities rather than 'what happened/happened'.
The fix has GOT to be to get the timeline straight again as the alternate timeline is a paradox that if I were writing this, would destroy the universe.
I say this in spite of all my logic telling me that this is bad logic and storytelling. I just have to have 'faith' that the writers, damon and carlton know what they are doing. This has to be something mindblowing that I'm missing as it's not like them to write a plot similar to what I suggested. It just seems wrong.
Carltona and Damon: Please blow us away with your originality! Don't blow the potential of this show from an all time great to a groan.
Welcome back! Missed you and look forward to analysis and stuff now that you're back on the continental US.
Hey Brian,
Thanks for posting those tour pics, that was awesome.
Perhaps a delinquantly bad idea but you should have snuck into the beach camp and created a little Lost Blog heartshaped easter egg for us by carving "Lost and Gone forever - Wuz here" onto a tree.
Until 2010,
Hobbes
Brian - six episodes in & I'm feeling similar about Flashforward as you. The first epi or two I was excited to see we were getting so much information. And the last few episodes I can't seem to focus and feel like I'm missing details. Or maybe I've been looking for the easter eggs on LOST so long that I'm looking for something that's not even there. I'm sticking with it as well, in hopes of improvement because the storyline is so interesting.
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